A Reflection: 1 Month into the Journey

I’ve been here just over a month.  Crazy.  I’ve had stressful days, restless days and exciting, adventurous days.  I’ve tried so many new foods, almost all of which are absolutely delicious.  I’ve discovered new “favorites” for myself here such as cheese masala dosa for lunch, kokum juice, and candy-coated saunf (fennel) which is given after meals at most restaurants.  But I’ve noticed that I feel a lot younger here.  I have to remind myself that I’m a junior in college and I’m a few months away from being 21 years old.  I am not a child anymore, but I kind of lose track of that sometimes based on my new lifestyle.

First, let me explain that India, if done right, is more or less a detox from the American lifestyle.  I’ve only had meat/“non-veg” once or twice so far and when I did, it was chicken.  I don’t drink any alcohol.  I pretty much have zero physical contact with anyone—no hugs, very few handshakes, no playing footsie (touching someone else’s feet is disrespectful).  I don’t consider myself a touchy-feely person back home, but it is strange to have no contact at all.  And of course, no dating.  There’s also a lot less caffeine.  Coffee shops don’t open until 11am.  Bye bye triple-shot lattes at Starbucks at 630am.

It’s strange to be in college but living at home, even if it’s not the home I grew up in.  I have a 10pm curfew (which I abide by happily) and all of my meals are prepared for me by my host-mother, the “help”, the program or a restaurant.  When I come home, I have a 12 year old sister who wants to know what I did today and what I’m doing later and why I’m doing it and how much fun I’m having doing it.  My host-brother is two years younger than me but somehow makes me feel like the younger one because he’s bigger than me and knows his way around here.

[Side Note: I absolutely adore my host-family, it’s just an adjustment for me after living independently in D.C. for two years]

At the program, everything is planned out for us without our knowledge.  We hear about things a day or two in advance, if then, and it can generally change on a whim without our consent.

And then there’s my classes.  It actually feels a little like high school in both the schedule and the structure.  Our classes are heavily lecture-based and our professors rarely want to hear our own opinions.  In the U.S., I’m used to being encouraged to question my professor (respectfully and constructively, of course) and the texts that we’re analyzing.  All of my international relations courses involve some discussion of current events, and our professors encourage us to think for ourselves and come up with new approaches to issues or topics.

Nearly every class I’m taking here feels like an Indian history course and the method of instruction is spoon-feeding.  Like when you were little and your parents held that gooey veggie mush up to your mouth on a spoon and said “chugga chugga choo choo” as they forced it down.  That’s what class is like sometimes.  The professors are there solely to dump their infinite wisdom on us and we should feel honored that they have lowered themselves to us dumb, lazy Americans.  My Development Economics professor is particularly stressful in many ways.  First, she has an odd way of explaining things, which is fine, but then gets angry when we try to explain it in a way that we understand.  For example, she told us that inelastic demand meant that if the prices go down, you won’t buy more.  Okay sure, but it makes a lot more sense to say that if the prices go up, you’ll still buy the same amount.  But it’s her way or the highway.  If I ask her a question or give an answer that she doesn’t like, she’ll either stare blankly at me like I’m mentally handicapped and she couldn’t possibly decipher what just came out of my mouth, or she will frankly tell me, “no” and move on to a more intelligent pupil.

In the end, it’s a very delicate balance between wanting higher academic standards with a larger role for ourselves in the classroom, and accepting that the Indian education system is structured differently than ours in the U.S.

Some of the professors here are quite interesting though.  My Social Justice professor does encourage more in-depth discussion sometimes, and my Public Health professor tells wonderful stories of villages and health clinics and teenage boys visiting brothels.  The language barrier does tend to cause some problems for us occasionally.  When we don’t understand something our professor has said, we’ll ask them to repeat it.  But rather than repeating the word or phrase we couldn’t quite hear due to pronunciation or a dog fight outside the classroom windows, they dumb down the concept because they think that’s what we were struggling with.

On top of living in a home again with parents who worry when my light is still on at 11:30pm, and being spoon-fed my academics, the basic fact that I can’t get around this country on my own without some hitches makes me feel like a child as well.  I have to constantly ask for help, for directions, for translations, for permission.  I’m exhausted by the end of the day because it took so much energy to cross the road, negotiate the ATM machine, AND print my paper in the right format from a random little street stall, plus the heat or the rains or both.  It may sound like I’m complaining about the strangest, smallest things but I’m learning that those are the most difficult adjustments.

Please don’t read this and worry that I’m not enjoying myself, because I definitely have many positive things to say about this country.  And not just about the food! But in the end, it wouldn’t be real life experience if it was all smooth sailing, right?